


Give and Take

by popfly



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Gapfillerpalooza, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-20
Updated: 2004-09-20
Packaged: 2017-11-09 06:27:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/452349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/popfly/pseuds/popfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gapfiller for season one, episode eight. Brian stands up for Justin. If you didn't watch the show, Justin's seventeen in this and his dad's a homophobic prick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give and Take

I was toweling dry when the phone rang, taking care around my ribcage, cursing Justin’s fuck of a father and wishing that the guys hadn’t been there to hold me back. I pushed those thoughts away and plodded across the bedroom, rubbing my hair with the thick terry cloth as I lifted the phone from its cradle. 

“Hello?” 

“Brian?” 

It was Lindsay, and a phone call from Lindsay in the morning was never a good thing. Either something had happened or she wanted to chew me out about something. I had the feeling it was going to be the latter. 

“Good morning,” I said, trying to be as charming as possible, hoping that if I buttered her up I could get away with a minor lashing. 

“I hope you’re not planning on trying to sweet talk me mister, because I have a very upset seventeen year old in my shower and it’s all your fault.” 

I groaned and dropped the towel, pinching the bridge of my nose. “All right. Let me have it.” 

She did, for a good twenty minutes, making me late for work and giving me a bitch of a headache in the meantime. 

I thought about the things that she said all the way to the office, and while I was in three consecutive meetings, and while I stared at my computer screen in the afternoon, my fingers drumming on my desk. 

_“He doesn’t want to go home.”_

_“Can you blame him? I wouldn’t want to live with that psychopath either.” I had touched my ribs again, wincing at the sharp pain._

_“Well, living with you can't be much better for him, what with you bringing random guys over all the time. I don't blame him for coming here last night.”_

_“It’s my fucking loft, Lindsay. Which means I can bring home whoever the fuck I want.”_

_“Fine, that’s fine. But letting some guy blow you in front of Justin's face, Brian? That’s harsh.”_

_It had been, but he needed to know that me letting him stay didn’t mean anything except that I didn’t want him roaming the streets. It didn’t mean we were married, it didn’t mean that I wasn’t going to fuck other men . . . lots of other men. Hotlanta had been a lesson._

_I sighed. “What do you want me to do?”_

_“Convince him to go home, to talk to his parents. It’s the least that you could do.”_

I rubbed my face and shook my head, clearing the previous conversation from my head, and focusing on the image on my screen. It was not my problem that Justin's feelings were hurt. He knew the score. He had from day one. And despite his mother's obvious delusion about him being my responsibility, I didn't have to cater to him like some child. If he was going to stay in my loft, he was going to play by my rules. 

Or he could go home.

I shot a glance at the clock. Justin would be getting out of school in about twenty minutes. I bit the inside of my cheek and watched the second hand travel. Then I pushed away from the desk and got to my feet. 

_*****_

When I pulled up in front of Justin’s school he was in the middle of a group of kids, hunched down and picking up stray papers that were strewn on the cement. The kids were laughing and sneering, and I squealed the tires at the curb and threw my door open. 

“Justin,” I called and he straightened. “Get in the car.” 

The kids were exchanging looks, shrugging and swearing and Justin gathered his papers to his chest and came through the gate in the fence. 

“What for?” 

“I said, get in the car,” I repeated, glaring. He looked timid and unsure and the kids behind him were grimacing in disgust and I just wanted him to get the fuck in the car. 

“Where are we going?” he asked, stammering slightly and hunching his shoulders. 

“Home.” I got in and slammed my door, waiting for him to do the same. 

I waited for him to buckle his seatbelt, you never knew when some idiot was going to ram into you, before squealing away, leaving the smell of burned rubber in our wake, and I hoped that the kids would choke on it.

Justin was quiet for a few minutes, shoving things into his backpack and looking sideways at me every few seconds. I kept my eyes on the road, one hand on the wheel, the other tucked inside my jacket, holding my side. 

“How,” he started, leaving his backpack at his feet. “How are you?” 

His fingers were sliding across the seat of the Jeep and I looked down at them and then up at him pointedly before look back out of the windshield. His hand stopped moving. 

“I’m fine. What were those guys saying?” 

“Oh, the usual.” He dismissed it, but he slumped forward slightly and I felt my nostrils flare. I could remember plenty of things that were “the usual” in high school, and I could still feel the sting of embarrassment, and then the shame that I was embarrassed. I blew out a breath. 

“Kids can be cruel,” I said, trying to lighten my tone. I didn’t have anything more to say, and I didn't want to offer up some useless platitude, so I didn't say more. But I felt like I should say something. Lindsay had been right, the kid did need a break. 

“Yeah,” he replied, and it was so melancholy that I let go of my side and gripped the steering wheel with that hand, my other one reaching over to squeeze his thigh. He looked up at me, breaking out into a grin. He was so easy. 

“You have to talk to your parents, Justin.” 

“What?” 

When I looked over, his eyes were wide. I took my hand back and squinted against the sun. “I told you we’re going home.”

"I thought you meant your place. Fuck this.” He reached for the door handle and I had to lean across him to hold the door shut. The sudden movement killed my side and I swore, pulling off to the side of the road. Justin smacked my hand away and lunged out of the car.

“Justin, don’t fucking move.” I got to my feet a little slower and came around the side of the Jeep. He was standing with his back to me, his shoulders rising and falling and his hands over his face. “Look, you have to talk to your parents. You obviously cannot stay at my place, and you don’t want to sleep on Lindsay and Melanie’s couch, it’s lumpier than shit, so what other choice do you have?”

He mumbled something and I grabbed his shoulders, spinning him around. 

“You want to repeat that?”

“I said I’ll think of something,” he said, staring down at the ground.

“No. You’re going to talk to your parents. Now get back in the car.” 

He stood still for a moment and I fully contemplated lifting him off his feet and physically depositing him in his seat, fuck my side, but then he moved, shuffling slowly towards the car and opening the door. I took a deep breath and rounded the back of the Jeep, climbing back in.

_*****_

His mother gave a nice little speech about wanting Justin to come home, about belonging at home with them. He picked at his fingernails the whole time and didn’t even flinch when his asshole of a father insulted me. I waited for his head to snap up, to see that look in his eye, for him to say something sharp and snotty and Justin, but he just watched his fingers fidgeting in his lap. Then Jennifer told him that he was staying there.

He looked up slowly stared her straight in the eye. It wasn't the look I was waiting for, but it was something. “Only if Dad says he’s sorry,” he said. “To Brian.” 

His jaw was set and I felt a swell of something in my chest. It felt a little like pride.

His father got to his feet and threw out his arm, pointing at me.

“Justin, he is the one that should be apologizing to you for Christ’s sakes, for making you think he loved you.”

”He never said he loved me. He said it was just a fuck, that’s all.” Justin’s father put a hand to his head, and Justin darted glances at me. “And I’m okay with that because that’s all it was. All it should be.”

I nodded a little to myself, even though I knew that he didn’t mean a damn word. I knew he thought it was more, wanted it to be more. I’d written the script, he was just reciting the lines.

Jennifer looked down at her hands and then back up at Justin, who was alternately flicking his eyes at me and the rug.

“I think you should go to your room now.”

Justin stood and held my eyes a moment, and I felt bad for the kid, but he was a kid, and this would be best for him. Then he started to walk away.

“One more thing, Justin.” Craig propped a hand on his hip.

“Craig,” Jennifer interjected almost pleadingly. Justin turned and raised his eyebrows. 

”No. No I’m going to say this. If you’re going to live in this house, there are rules you have to obey. You are not to go to gay bars or talk about your disgusting lifestyle.”

My head jerked up and I could hear the blood rushing in my ears. I stared at the back of Craig's head and my mouth tightened. I wanted to get up and deck the guy. Justin just looked on in disbelief.

“And you are never, ever to see him again.”

I had heard enough. Fuck Lindsay, Justin wasn’t staying there with this prick. He was not going to be forced to be someone he wasn’t just because this homophobic asshole wouldn’t accept him. I swallowed and licked my lips.

“So in other words, for Justin to live here with you, he has to deny who he is, what he thinks, and how he feels.”

Craig didn’t even bother looking my way, he just waved a hand at me. “No one asked for your opinion, pal.”

I tamped down the flare of anger at his dismissal and got to my feet, using every ounce of my willpower not to deck the guy. “Well, that’s not love,” I said, staring him down. “That’s hate.” 

I was three steps past him when he bit out, “Get the fuck out of my house.”

I kept walking, Justin’s eyes following me. “Justin, you coming?” I didn’t wait for his answer, I just let myself out. I went slowly down the steps and got my keys out of my pocket. I hadn’t even hit sidewalk when the door to the house opened behind me and I heard footsteps on the cement. I didn’t look back.

He got in the car quietly, and he kept his eyes down and his hands in his lap until we parked in front of my building. I started to get out of the car and he cleared his throat.

“Brian?”

I looked back over my shoulder and met his eyes.

“Thanks.”

And then he got out of the car. I watched him cross in front of the Jeep and then I stood and closed my door. I put my hand on his arm and he turned around.

“You’re welcome, Justin.”


End file.
